traditional characters that are dramatically different to their simplified counterparts?

[tooironic]

I'm hoping to improve my reading speed for the traditional script, so I'm looking for traditional characters that underwent significant changes during the simplification process.

This way I can create a simple "cheat sheet" for key characters that I need to commit to memory.

Here's the list I've created, let me know if you can think of any others:

1. 穀 → 谷
   
2. 蘋 → 苹
   
3. 韋 → 韦
   
4. 興 → 兴
   
5. 與 → 与
   
6. 盡 → 尽
   
7. 寶 → 宝
   
8. 嘆 → 叹
   
9. 鳳 → 凤
   
10. 廠 → 厂
    
11. 廣 → 广
    
12. 誇 → 夸
    
13. 滅 → 灭
    
14. 親 → 亲
    
15. 業 → 业
    
16. 寧 → 宁
    
17. 鄉 → 乡
    
18. 餘 → 余
    
19. 婦 → 妇
    
20. 麗 → 丽
    
21. 歸 → 归
    
22. 顯 → 显
    
23. 龜 → 龟
    
24. 奪 → 夺
    
25. 鄰 → 邻
    
26. 斃 → 毙
    
27. 蠟 → 蜡
    
28. 艦 → 舰
    
29. 憲 → 宪
    
30. 賓 → 宾
    
31. 護 → 护
    
32. 驚 → 惊
    
33. 藝 → 艺
    
34. 響 → 响
    
35. 塵 → 尘
    
36. 竈 → 灶
    
37. 膚 → 肤
    
38. 憑 → 凭
    
39. 蹤 → 踪
    
40. 淚 → 泪
    
41. 傑 → 杰
    
42. 潔 → 洁
    
43. 竃 → 灶
    

[Meng Lelan]

This is going to be a very useful list. Green rep to you!

[imron]

This post by Renzhe should be all you need.

[skylee]

Also,

書 → 书

蘇 → 苏

辦 → 办

為 → 为

衛 → 卫

葉 → 叶

聽 → 听

PS -

從 → 从

眾 → 众

無 → 无

靈 → 灵

[Olle Linge]

I used Renzhe's post (the one imron has linked to) when learning simplified a while back. It worked very well and should cover most of what you need. Regard this post as a particularly strong up-vote on imron's link.

[daofeishi]

誇 → 夸

Why didn't that one retain the 言-radical?

[WestTexas]

让->讓

[Meng Lelan]

甚麼 --- 什么

Those were among the first ten traditional characters I ever learned when I first enrolled in first year Chinese (taught by a professor from Taiwan then).

[renzhe]

甚麼 --- 什么

That's an interesting one I'd like to expand on a bit.

Although 什么 is used in simplified Chinese to replace 甚麼, 什 is actually not a simplification of 甚 -- both are in Kangxi and the form of both is unaffected by the simplification. 简化字总表 does not list it as a simplification.

什 is a phonetic loan which eventually replaced 甚 in this particular phrase in simplified materials.

You can see it when reading older classics in simplified characters -- they typically use 甚么 for 甚麼. 甚么 is correct (but exceedingly rare) simplified Chinese.

[萌就一個字一控一輩子]

okie, think i'll help making thing a bit clear here...

穀 → 谷

this is acturaly two different word, 穀 is seed type of food (like rice or grain), and 谷 means mountain valley, but in simplified version they just use it to cover what 穀 stands for.

竈 → 灶

same, two different word, but this time, it means teh same thing. don't feel strange, in Chinese a word can have different writing style but still means the same, just like there are around 14 different way to write the very same word 回...

蹤 → 踪

same as above, two different words, same meaning.

甚麼 --- 什么

it suppost to be "什麼" that means "what", so it's a half half...

the hardest part about Chinese is there are more then just "Triditional" or "Simplified" version in writing, there are acturaly five different basic style...

正體字 = Classical Form - Literature focus, a word have to have properly link back to the source of the word to be taking into this style, or it have to be used far and wide enough to get here, both 蹤 and 踪 belong to this style.

俗體字 = Common Form - More commonly used by people, dosen't link back to teh source of the word, but accept by everyone, like "粧", which in the classical form it shall be "妝".

簡體字 = Reducing Form - This is acturaly the simplified form of writing, but it was will limited and controled, there are only around 300 words in this style.

簡化字 = Simplified Form - Start since 1956, a mixture of all three styles above plus newly created words to make writing easier, alots of people clam this style has lost it's soul for the art part of Chinese writing, but for real, if it makes learning easier for everyone, I am all ok with it... but I studied Traditional anyway...

繁體字 = Traditional Form - Since Mainland China start to use simplified form, the rest of teh words falling into this style to mark out the difference.

[Takeshi]

Yes, that's something that I had totally felt, though not put it in those exact 5 categories. I would be very interested to see examples of what characters are Classical Form, Common Form, and Reducing Form. Especially your "Reducing Form".

Well, I made a topic for it: http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/39414-simplifications-that-are-acceptable-in-traditional-text/